Sunday Reflection with Fr Robin Gibbons - 31st July 2016

Fr Jacques Hamel

Sunday 31 July 17th Sunday in Ordinary Time

As I get older I have noticed a change in me that I hadn't thought possible at one point in my life. Maybe my mother's death has helped me to move because it's a gradual stripping away, inside myself, of deep attachment to those small articles and treasures of life that make up our store of memories, hopes and enjoyments. It's been a strange experience. I still love and appreciate my icons and other artifacts and I've no intention of getting rid of them, but I'm now more aware that they are only for my use for a time. Why? Well because like the rich man in Luke's parable, God, one day, will demand my life of me! Not I hope in quite the same way as the story puts it!

When I was a Benedictine monk, the vow of Conversion of Life included sharing all possessions with the community, St Benedict did not want the monk to have personal belongings except for work and necessity, a fine ideal, but human nature being what it is, I think most of us had some a few small things that we regarded as 'ours' in a particular way. Yet only now do I really understand what he meant, we can have possessions, money, home for ourselves and others use, yet at the same time can hold them lightly, know that they are gifts which we in our turn must hand on. In the end we all face God alone, just as we really are and that is what matters, "let go and let God" is the phrase, that inner attitude is really being rich in the things of God.

This week has been a dramatic week for Catholics, the murder of Pere Jacques Hamel reminds us of Christ's call to give one's life in service of others, something that those of us who are priests instinctively know is our vocation, but it also places before us a powerful symbol of sacrifice and self giving. Paul reminds us that the life and death of each of us has its influence on others, that is the true treasure of God (Rm 14).

Who knows what wonders the life and death of such a gentle priest will work to replace hate with forgiveness and love in others hearts? Symbols speak to the depths of our hearts, Pere Jacques is one, Pope Francis, silent at the Auschwitz-Birkenau Concentration camp is another, he prayed for the gift of tears there, the compassion of God, may his prayer be truly ours: "Lord, have pity on your people. Lord, forgive so much cruelty."

Fr Robin Gibbons is an Eastern Rite Chaplain for the Melkite Greek Catholics in Britain